US Is Going To Use Tabqah Air Base In Syrian Province Of Raqqah – Reports2.4444444444444 out of 5 based on 9 ratings. 9 user reviews.

US Is Going To Use Tabqah Air Base In Syrian Province Of Raqqah – Reports

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According to unconfirmed Turkish media reports, both the United States and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have reached an agreement allowing the US-led coalition to use the Tabqah air base south of Tabqah town in the province of Raqqah as a US collation base.

According to local sources, American soldiers are already doing maintenance at the base, and several helicopters of the US-led coalition have alredy been deployed there.

Yesterday, ISIS managed to regain Al-Sinaa district in the eastern part of Raqqah city, and so far the US-backed SDF has still been unable to regain the district.

However, according to Kurdish sources, the SDF’s priority now is the evacuation of civilians.

According to opposition sources, violent clashes are currently taking place between ISIS and SDF fighters in Ratla village.

The US-led coalition announced that its warplanes carried out 20 air strikes against ISIS targets in Raqqa Province during the last 24 hours.

Opposition sources said at least six civilians lost their life as a result of US airstrikes in the last 24 hours. However, civil casualties began to decline after tens of thousands of civilians managed to get out of the city.

The Kurds are not doing themselves any favours by giving Syrian air base to the US. All they are doing is helping the US extend the duration of this war. They will be in for a rude awakening when this is all over.

Real Anti-Racist Action

The Kurd’s like the Jews only live in chaos and war. In peace there power melts away. The Kurd’s need the war to keep going on for 80 more years so they can expand and thrive and get Mi6 and Mossad money. In peace the Kurd’s would shrink just as Israel looses power in peace time.

John Whitehot

and you know a lot about mossad money.

Davey Price

Yes its US taxpayers cash, how else a sliver of land like Israel survive unless it is bailed out no end. 50billion a yr from the US, why are they supporting anti Syrian proxies? If Syria failed Israel and US would launch THE real war on Terrorism. Golan is rich in oil Gas & minerals, they illegally drilled for it, so a collapsed Syrian state equals land seizures and the oil and gas fields at Deir az Zoir wasting there dependence on US. A Palestinian state in northern Sinai BUT it won’t happen the Shi’a axis and Syria have Israels alQaedda allies in what is meant to be UN buffer zone cornered and IS rats are dying like an Israeli PM telling the truth, so that’s lots and lots of Dead rats

John Whitehot

he he he

Ronald

It is a SyAAF base , it does not belong to the Kurds to give to anyone .

Mountains

Finally total move in as expected. Lean back and relax. Recently the US general in Raqqah said that the US forces had no intention of leaving Raqqah for the forseeable future

Manuel Flores Escobar

thats said during lebanon war 1982…

Ramone

Of course they don’t intend to leave. When has the US ever voluntarily left a country it invited itself to? They are like that annoying uninvited radioactive house guest that never fucking leaves your living room until you form a neighborhood coalition of tough guys and physically remove his cheetos munching ass from the premises

AMHants

Out of curiousity how did they get rid of them in Vietnam?

Kapricorn4

58,000 dead US draftees ?

AMHants

Ouch, no wonder there are so many helicopter accidents when they want to bring their Forces home? Not a good look. RIP. I was a child at the time, but, also had no interest in politics, national or international. Then you grow up, only knowing a small part of the story.

Kapricorn4

Not to mention the 3 million dead Vietnamese civilians, the one million Cambodians and one million Laotians, who died in the conflict.

One out of every 10 Americans who served in Vietnam was a casualty. 58,148 were killed and 304,000 wounded out of 2.7 million who served. Although the percent that died is similar to other wars, amputations or crippling wounds were 300 percent higher than in World War II. 75,000 Vietnam veterans are severely disabled.

EmilyEnso

No one much important then…..sarc!

Andrew Pate

The US police even shot students protesting the war at Kent University. Also the Viet Cong/Freedom fighters never gave up and dug tunnels and dismantled their weapons to move them around and reassembled them. They worked like ants and the Yanks got high on Opium and got freaked out. Strange the UN has never pressed for War crimes against the US as they used all kinds of weapons especially Napalm that burns deep layers of skin and Depleted Uranium where even today millions are still suffering. But of course as usual they are the good guys in the eyes of the world and can never do wrong. Only USA’s enemy’s speak out the rest just say “yes Sir.”

AMHants

Thanks and it is horrific. Owing to ignorance, being a child at the time and having no interest in anything outside my bubble, I kept out of the Vietnam Argument. It was only in the last decade I heard about Agent Orange, and it was not something that lived in the White House. Didn’t it come out of the Monsanto stable of agri-chemicals and haven’t Monsanto now merged with Beyer? Weren’t Beyer heavily connected to Hitler and his Forces?

Although, seriously ignorant of Vietnam, I actually need to find out more, including how the Forces were treated when they returned home and how the people of the US made their voices heard at the time. Not forgetting the bravery of the pig farmers in Vietnam. For some reason, Eastern Ukraine, the strength, determination and character of the people, fighting against Kiev and all the Western World throws at them, reminds me of Vietnam. Pig Farmers, Miners and Farmers, defending their territory and people are a far stronger opponent than an academic, when it comes to warfare.

Thanks for your interesting reply and Bartmaeus also provided me an interesting comment, this morning, that seriously links into this. It is all down to the timelines and Mafia involvement.

The comment was a reply, that can be found on the article, over on ‘Russian Insider’ – ‘Syrian False Flag Setup or Damage Control?’

Andrew Pate

I was 11 when America got involved but like I have said before about my Mum’s possible influence about her own political views made me read books and newspapers that she would have had lying around and then trying to comprehend what our news was being said caused many arguments between us and of course to admit to being sympathetic towards people fighting for their own rule and being branded as communist was a no no. Of course it all started after the French had been badly beaten by Ho Chi Minh on some 17th parallel and free elections were meant to to take place after 2 years to unify the country just like in Korea was meant to happen after WW2. This article explains things better than I can I have not read it all but seems accurate to me.

history.com/topics/vietnam-war/vietnam-war-history

I could not find that Russian Insider article as I am not on Facebook or they wanted me to sign up now. I have been on that site before but seems to be a closed shop now, but sure looks like false flags are in the wind and yet supposedly quiet on the western front about the latest chlorine attack. Maybe Donald is too busy doing video’s of his wrestling days is keeping him too busy..

Just went back to Russian Insider and clicked the cross and the site opened up so will read up on that now. Thanks.

AMHants

Thanks and I will have a look at the link later. When you look back, you can see the same script being played out time and time again. It always starts the same way, but, with Vietnam, not necessarily finishes how they want.

With regards FB, you are not missing much. I keep my contacts down to as few as possible and just to keep in contact with those I lost touch with.

dutchnational

As long as Assad does not want to talk with the SDF about the future of Syria, at least about the future of northern Syria, he gives them a moral carte blanche to act as they see fit.

Solomon Krupacek

netherland is guilty for srebrenica. this was the decison in haag :P

dutchnational

And this relates to the article?

Btw, in case you have not read the papers : ever heard of Mladic?

Solomon Krupacek

related to your bile

PZIVJ

dutchnational “gives them a moral carte blanche to act as they see fit.” Oh really ! Besides the first sentence of article is: “According to unconfirmed Turkish media reports” Which means Turkish propaganda. Of course Tabqah airbase will be cleaned up for helo ops. Hopefully US coalition and SDF spend much time and money fixing it up nice before it is returned to the right full owners (SAA) in the future. HAHA

dutchnational

Not all propaganda is incorrect. As long as a month ago, there were reports of US engineers working on the airfield.

Ronald

Assad is open to speaking to Syrians , but SDF has fallen under US control , and they are not open to talking to Assad , and by their anti-government moves , the so called “base treaty”, are trying to hammer a wedge between the Kurds and the government . That will keep the war going , and decimate the Kurds as they get hit from the north and if this wedge is allowed , from the south .

Valery Grigoryev

Interesting question: why did the US decide to use that base right now, while Tabqa was under SDF control during few months so far? Is not it because SAA is becoming now closer and closer to Deir-ez-Zor? :)

Tabqa is on Western side of euphrates….. Right… Given putin uncle’s warning how CAN US fly it’s planes from there. …………

John Mason

No agreement with the Syrian Government and the Kurds, treacherous people, have no legitimacy of allocating property to a foreign entity especially one, US, who are in violation of International Law and UN Charter that they happen to be signatory to and have it ratified. Besides, the Kurds who claim to be original habitants is totally false. Assyrians were the inhabitants of that region since 2300BC.

tigbear

Might is right. I told you this would happen. What’s Syria going to do? Complain to the UN? Look at the Palestinians. They’ve been complaining for 80 years. The Syrians should have concentrated on Kurds and moderate rebel forces. These were the ones that Syria should have worried about because they have US backing. ISIS don’t (not officially anyway). You let the US in and they will put a military base in the ground – smack dang in the middle of Syria territory. Good luck getting rid of it. Syrian forces bomb it, it will be US vs Syria. See who is going to win.

Assad should have done something before the US put troops on the ground. Once they did that, it meant colonization and partitioning.

Obama was Zionist Lite. Assad had 5-6 years to complete operations before a possible change of guard, and a committed Zionist like Trump came into office.

What did he do for SIX YEARS?

Chasing ISIS around. He didn’t touch SDF, FSA or YPG, etc.

tigbear

Russia is to blame as well. They are so politically correct, it’s not funny. They too concentrated on ISIS because they didn’t want to strike at DEMOCRATIC groups like SDF or FSA that were fighting for “Freedom” and “Democracy”.

Assad too. He’s a hypocrite. He got exposed to western liberalism while he was overseas and was the generation of leaders that were wooed and feted for being “moderate” by Obama’s people (John Kerry etc) who went around to persuade that the US was embarking on a new era of getting along with dictators so long as they embraced economic liberalism.

tigbear

Gaddafi’s son fell for it, and convinced his father. They worked on Bashar too. He started to liberalize the economy, and went soft on the insurgents and potential troublemakers, and he kicked out his father’s colleagues, replacing the old guard with western-liberalism oriented people. The countryside which wasn’t doing too well under the economic liberalism started to turn against Bashar.

Libya fell and before Bashar could regroup, the insurgency against him started. He was ill-prepared for what followed. He had let the military run down quite a lot, demoted a lot of the old guard, including the ones in the military.

His response was weak, and as I said, he concentrated on the wrong guys.

tigbear

Russia came in but they also didn’t want to touch SDF etc and limited their help to just removing ISIS.

So this is where we are. USA will hang onto SDF areas, consolidate their hold, building US bases there.

Is this what Assad wanted? What was the point in sacrificing all those people’s lives?

It might even be better to let ISIS free rein, and Assad just stay in Damascus, and let ISIS fight the USA … because we know Assad isn’t going to, and Russia isn’t either.

tigbear

It’s not a satisfactory end for the USA either as they wanted regime change, but they will settle for this. They have effectively partitioned Syria.

They will build bases and after that, no one can budge them.

Stupid, stupid Assad. He RUINED his country. His father made a bad mistake putting this weak man as his successor.

Having US bases in the middle of Syria is really bad for the Shias.

Assad should have done something earlier. Once US troops have boots on the ground, it’s much harder to fight them.

John Whitehot

but in the end:

Israel lost. the US lost. Saudia lost.

You can add all the blocks you want.

tigbear

I am being a realist, moron.

John Whitehot

realists talk and analyze when things are over, not like “US has effectively partitioned Syria”, when the war isn’t over and still there are plenty of unknowns in the future.

If you’re an adult person, either you’re doing propaganda or you’re out of your senses.

tigbear

Yeah, the USA could be just kidding about building bases, and after spending billions on this war, could turn around and just say “We were just fooling around, you can have all the land back, Assad” …

As I said, realists discuss things with the way things ARE right now and the way things are going, and not by saying meaningless non-sequiturs like “Anything can happen in the future”.

And what is my “propaganda” supposed to be about? And who’s my “employer”? You said somewhere else I am working for some employer, making these posts.

John Whitehot

I’ll be there when you’ll say that “Russia failed to defend Syria” and so on.

You already started with the racket, no matter how much you change your words or how much you try to appear different from your other personas.

Ma_Laoshi

This just looks inconsistent on a single screen: here you say (correctly) that the war isn’t over, while in your preceding post you assert statements about “the end’ as fact.

John Whitehot

I did not say the war is over. I said that Israel, US and Saudia lost.

That’s one thing that can be stated because they failed in removing Assad, something that is also evident from at least two incontrovertible changes of strategy, those of Turkey and Qatar.

Even if the above countries have failed to reach their primary objectives, sadly the war is far by over.

Yet at this point, what should be crystal clear, is that ISIS wasn’t their priority as they always said.

They created ISIS together with Israel to fulfill their regime change agenda. When people everywhere in the world, but especially in eastern europe will talk about freedom and democracy, they better be remembering what kind of monstruosity has been put up by those who have ALWAYS presented theirselves as the defenders of freedom and democracy, yet have committed all kinds of abominations in the name of them.

cortisol

Regardless of USA opening an air base or two in the “Kurdish state”, it will not prevent SDF from getting sandwhiched between Turks, Syrians, Iraqis and Iranians in post ISIS/Qaeda/Nusra world. That is, if SDF don’t start getting realistic in negotiating.

Placing all eggs in USA may not be a very wise choice in a historical context of how other US “partners” have ended up. Mind you, SDF is even one of the weakest partners.

Thegr8rambino

SAA should just storm in and retake the base for themselves, killing any and every motherfucker in their way. PERIOD.

AMHants

Why?

Thegr8rambino

VYY NOT?

Thegr8rambino

Why not? It was theirs originally

AMHants

How old is Syria and how old is Israel?

Thegr8rambino

Syria is much, much older than Israel. What does that have to do with it anyway???? Stupid question really

AMHants

It might go over your head, but, others will have read the comments and formed their own, independent opinions.

Thegr8rambino

Which comments?

tigbear

They have lost the SDF areas. Syria should concentrate on the northern YPG-held area. Syria doesn’t want the whole northern bloc going to the USA too, which could happen. He should just limit the damage to islands that the SDF hold onto in Syria.

And goddammit, can’t he resign or something???

And let a better person be leader? This guy does not care about Syria. He doesn’t give a damn if SDF hand over large pockets of Syrian territory to the USA. If he is like this, just go away. Go and migrate to the USA or the UK and resume the life he had before and the life he seems to hanker for and hang around the people he seems to get on well with.

tigbear

He has very little sense of nationalism. He let things go to this horrible state, where millions have left Syria, and half a million people have been killed.

He treats this war like a weekend paintball party. He has no sense of urgency about the situation.

At this rate, ISIS would be better to depend on for getting Syria back into Syrian people’s hands.

tigbear

He should have foreseen this: the US establishing a military base in Syria, consolidating their hold onto the regions they’ve captured.

As I have said, once they do this, it will be very hard to get rid of them.

Russia too. They have blame in this. They also chased after ISIS and let the SDF and others go.

And Assad and Russia are still not going after SDF and FSA. There were so many people helping Assad: Iraqis, Iranians, Lebanese … even Palestinians. He should have finished the war early.

Ronald

You are truly sick .

tigbear

I said that ISIS would attack America but Assad wouldn’t. Just stating a fact. You don’t have to get your panties in a knot.

Davey Price

IS are near defeated, alQaeda pockets are surrounded The FSA are nothing but mercenaries most are surrounded on the Jordan / Syrian border The Iraqi PMU are sweeping up IS rats along there border with Syria With Syrian army winning the war with its allies in central Syria in a week or so Deir az zoir will be next afterwards the 4th mechanized division and other tank divisions will steam roll idlib as that’s the Syrians favourite warfare The Kurds will be squeezed from left to right of northern Syria by the Syrians to come to a deal, as the Kurds friends north of them, would be loving to take a bite or two. The US is in a weak position here as astana talks proved results Kurds if wise will talk with Assad and Russia

tigbear

Yeah, but no one’s willing to hit the US. How are they going to get the land back? They have to fight the US. The US isn’t going to hand over the areas. It’s going to build bases smack-dab in the middle of Syria for Israel, to give a message to Assad and to Iran. It’s like Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. Cuba can’t kick the USA out. Maybe even worse, there are islands controlled by SDF in the middle of Syria. SDF is acting like the legitimate Syrian government, handing over the land to the US to build bases on.

It’s like Israel building a base in the middle of Iran. This is a great blow to the sovereignty of Syria.

tigbear

Syria, Iran, Iraq, Russia, Turkey can all oppose these bases but what are they going to do about it? The UN is hopeless. Israel ignores the 90 resolutions against it. The US backs them up.

Only solution is to unleash the people willing to take up arms against the USA, and that’s ISIS and Al Qaeda. But that won’t be acceptable to the Syrian government and Russia. And if it becomes like that, Islamic militants fighting the US, it will be like Afghanistan, a decades long war. I don’t think Assad would let that happen and Syria’s allies won’t either because these militants are Sunni.

Ma_Laoshi

The ability to frame the issue and set the narrative is a key US power besides the dollar. When Russia started talking about “separating the terrorists from the moderates”, never stopping to notice that the US+poodles have no business being in Syria whatsoever, they conceded that power. That was, uhmm, before they’d even unpacked their bags in Latakia.

Future historians will have to tell us why the Kremlin opted to fight America’s war for their partners. Maybe they thought that doing so would stop the NYT from writing mean things.

tigbear

Russia was the same before the Korean War. Didn’t show up to the Security Council to prevent the Korean War. It had a veto in the SC but didn’t use it. As a result, 4 million people died in the Korean War. Could have been avoided if Russia had used the veto.

Russia is strange. It was the USSR back then but practically the same.

John Whitehot

yaya we know, Russia always fails to protect somebody so in the end people die.

John Whitehot

Cuba has an agreement for Guantanamo Bay with the US, which pay an annual fee to the Cuban government.

Ma_Laoshi

Like we don’t know how that works. When Qing-dynasty China was weak weak weak, they entered into what’s still called the “Five Unequal Treaties” over there. What do you think would’ve happened if they’d declined to sign?

tigbear

“The current government of Cuba regards the U.S. presence in Guantánamo Bay as illegal and insists the Cuban–American Treaty was obtained by threat of force and is in violation of international law. Some legal scholars judge that the lease may be voidable.” (Wikipedia).

Point is Cuba doesn’t want the US there and thinks its occupation is illegal. But can’t do anything about it. ____

And Cuba has only cashed a check once, and this was by mistake apparently.

John Whitehot

The details and the what ifs do not matter. You can’t compare historical, geographical and political situations which are totally different like this.

It’s the kind of simplification that again, serves your employers little dirty interests, that by now are clearly to destabilize the situation in Syria.

tigbear

Who are my employers?

tigbear

Nothing inaccurate with what I said. Neither Cuba and Syria want the US in their backyard. Both feel it’s a violation of laws. Neither can do anything about it – US military is too powerful. A perfect comparison. Exactly what I said in my original comment, and then you started to split hairs and make inaccurate statements such as Cuba receives a regular income from it (only ONE payment and that was by mistake).

And you’re the one who’s trying to look at the details and technicalities, not me – I just brought up the information about the leaders’ views about Gitmo to correct you. It seems like you enjoy pontificating, maybe to compensate for something. You must be a bore in real life.

John Whitehot

Also, nobody gives a fuck about “how leadership feel about something”, it’s the international treaties the only things that bear some value.

If Cuba does not denounce the treaty it signed, it can feel whatever it wants, but it’s got obligations. And the fact that it does not cashes the checks is something for which nobody will ever even waste a syllabe.

But don’t let me bore you with the technicalities, besides, when you’re Israel or the US you can allow yourself to not give a single fuck about treaties, international laws and all that boring stuff that should govern the relationships between countries

Andrew Pate

So if the US has an agreement for Guantanamo with Cuba, Russia had an agreement with Ukraine over the Black sea port. So if Crimea had stayed with Ukraine can you tell me if Russia would still have that port now? And if Ukraine retook that port which anything Russia is being taken over does that mean that Cuba could also force the US out of Guantanamo?

Ma_Laoshi

No no no, remember Samantha Power and Susan Rice, “Kosovo was not a precedent”–just because they say so. :-(

John Whitehot

look, history isn’t made like this. you can’t really argue like “but what would had happened if..”

You can do this kind of speculations, but as a game, or an exercise.

In that case, Ukraine would never been able to “retake that port”.

There’s also a big difference: the Cubans are behind their government, in a hypothetical confrontation with the US (Unless Castro decides to say, invade the Keys, but this is not a Chuck Norris movie), while the Crimeans are aligned with Russia and not Ukraine.

AMHants

Who invited the US? Is the removal of the ‘Flight Safety Agreement’ still up and running? Why can’ the US just be sent home?

Ma_Laoshi

One defriends to US by killing their orcs in sufficient quantities; it’s the only way. The Kremlin’s clinging to a policy of imaginary partnership has, let’s face it, parallels with Merkel’s inability to admit she’s made a mistake.

AMHants

I find it interesting how the Kremlin is playing things. Sit back and let your opponent show there hand. The beauty of watching them shed their layers, like an onion.

It is so easy to be an armchair gossip, without having to see the bigger picture, to assume they know best. Plus, how many of us could play a better game, than than the Kremlin, hiding their hand?

Ma_Laoshi

Maybe but by the time the US had shown their hand, suddenly they had 1000+ orcs, bases, airfields–let’s face it these guys are *not* sitting back when they mean business. As we discuss this, it’s rather the Kremlin awaiting in trepidation “What is Trump still going to do?”

John Whitehot

no. You are missing one basic principle, together with all those who post similar ideas:

The US will not go to war with Russia over Syria. Without it, the US will not be able to accomplish anything, except prolonging the war on terrorism, and maybe cause some terror acts themselves. Oh yes, there are the provocations, but again, they aren’t going to change things a little bit.

That’s it, there’s no more to add.

Ma_Laoshi

“Attacking Iraq would be madness, so the US is not going to do it. Given the bitter lessons from Iraq, attacking Libya would be madness, so the US is not going to do it. It would be madness for Europe to sanction itself over which group of thieves is allowed to loot Ukraine.”

Adding these up, assurances such as yours mean nothing to me. Who said anything about going to war with Russia? One just destroys the SAA, while Russia looks away. Then the proxies will do the rest.

It’s not a prediction mind you, but Washington has complete freedom of action to do the above. They’re still working the numbers to decide whether that’s actually what they want to do.

AMHants

It is not the size that counts, but, the quality.

I must admit I did laugh, when the US tanks turned up in Poland, but, there batteries were empty. Oooooops.

Ma_Laoshi

For some reasons known only to future historians, this is clearly the outcome the Kremlin *wanted*. Rumors of a secret deal abound. Meanwhile, in the real world *the sanctions war escalates *NATO is still on the move *a big false flag looms ominously over Syria. Is there someone in the Kremlin with the standing to say “Mr. President, you may have made a mistake”?

tigbear

No, I don’t think there is a secret deal. Putin is just overcautious and wants to do things by the book. Years of the media demonizing him and hounding him over the smallest thing, just because he defended Russians in Georgia and helped the Crimeans, and because some protesters who desecrated a church got arrested, he is very sensitive now. The Zionist media has made sure to paint him as some sort of fascist monster. So he’s learned to play by the book and not do things too aggressively.

This is wrong of course. In the long term, it would have been better if he had just taken over Georgia and Ukraine and said “To hell with the critics”.

They’re going to make a case of war against someone no matter what they do. You could be Billy Graham, but it won’t stop them from turning you into some would be genocidist if they had you in their sights.

tigbear

And he miscalculated the situation. He thought Clinton would be harder to deal with than Trump; it’s the opposite. Clinton would have spat fire but she would have kept the fight to just arming insurgents and doing drone attacks. Putin thought Trump would soft ball it. Turns out Trump is an arch-Zionist. He would do whatever he’s ordered to do, including putting his nation in danger.

Therefore, Putin should have cleaned up before Trump started to make moves on Syria. By the time of the chemical attacks, it was too late. Russia makes any attack on the US, it will be Russia-US war. Not very good for the Russians and not good for the world either.

Not only would Russia have a problem in Syria, but also on their own soil.

Ma_Laoshi

Putin fans and Putin haters are curiously united in ascribing to the good man superpowers which he in fact does not possess. Trump vs Clinton and the way Washington does business generally are completely outside the Kremlin’s control. Two centuries of experience should suffice to conclude that they’re probably up to no good there. Doing the Syrian campaign slow slow slow just opens the door for the Dark Throne to try all kinds of mischief.

I thought it admirable that Russia did *not* roll on to Kiev. Then they would have become an occupier over a hostile population who have guns too. These things always look easy before you start them–home by Christmas–and always end in tears. And unlike the US, Russia has to pay with real money. Instead of carrying on with their flawed but natural trading partner, Kiev critters chose to become the European powerhouse for… prostitution. Apparently, the search for scapegoats must now run its course before they look inside themselves and say “we made a mistake”.

But yes, Putin should say “to hell with the critics” 3x per day just to keep in practice. Some long-term constant of Russian elites seems to preclude it. Wonder how often Trump switches on the TV with trembling hands “What is Russia going to say about me today?”

Mohammed Asim

The formation of Kurds fighters were acceptable but they are crossing there limits after the war the Kurds will be dependent on us were the Syrian govt will manage on its own after some time as it is having and it will get lots of resource

RamboDave

The Tabqah air base is exactly 6 miles from the present location of the SAA. It is within mortar and artillery and Grad rocket range of the SAA. The US is not stupid enough to stay there long term with anything of high value if hostilities break out. It is a short runway. They probably want to use it for helicopters against ISIS over in Raqqa, only 40 miles away.

Ma_Laoshi

Perhaps; or, they declare another zone-for-me-but-not-for-thee, and squeeze the SAA out of Grad range. For they moment, they probably just like it that it’s *their* choice now.